Wisdom Teeth

You must have, at some point, wondered why the third molars get mentioned by dentists a lot more than the first and second molar. Why is it that these teeth have another special name, i.e. wisdom teeth? This is because these are the very last teeth to erupt in the mouth, and often cause quite a bit of trouble when there is lack of space in the arches.

Not having adequate space to erupt can cause wisdom teeth to become impacted. This phenomenon can cause symptoms like pericoronitis, swelling of the surrounding soft tissues, trismus (limited mouth opening), foul mouth odour, pain and bleeding, inability to use the affecting side for chewing and biting food etc. In order to relieve these symptoms, dental surgeons extract the molars. However, not all molars need to be extracted – if they appear to be erupting in a normal manner and direction, there is absolutely no reason why they should be removed from the mouth. Impaction is diagnosed with the help of x-rays and full mouth radiographs. If your wisdom tooth is giving you trouble, book an appointment at Victoria Dental today to have it professionally assessed and extracted before things get any worse!